The lightsaber is the coolest weapon ever. Search your feelings. You know it to be true.

An anti-grav belt around her supple waist labored to support an energy-epee, a beam-cutlass, an atomic broadsword, a space-rapier, six tactical nuclear throwing stars and a brace of micro-gatling pistols.

Laser blades exist purely because of the Rule of Cool. Glowing is cool, so Power Glows, therefore a weapon that's actually made out of glow must be really powerful. In real life, making such fancy swords is Awesome but Impractical when Frickin' Laser Beams decide war, but then again, laser blade duels are frickin' awesome, and that's enough justification to be showed on-screen. Another possible in-universe justification in that the duelists are somehow invulnerable to ranged weaponry, whether thanks to Deflector Shields, The Force or any other such Applied Phlebotinum, thus forcing the revival of old-school sword martial arts with laser blades.

Note that, although the most prolific Trope Codifier is the lightsaber, you'll almost never see the word "lightsaber" outside of that particular franchise for understandable legal reasons. Thus, such blades are given any variety of slightly less majestic monikers, such as "beam saber", "energy sword", "plasma knife" and, for the paronomasiacs, "laser blade"note Because it sounds like "razor blade", get it?. The energy blade concept tends to be Older Than They Think; the Trope Maker is the "force knife" from the Lucky Starr novels written by Isaac Asimov under the pen-name Paul French in the 1950s.

Sometimes, especially in video games, a laser blade may be mounted on a fighter ship. This version is even more of an Impossibly Cool Weapon than the usual melee variety.

All the various energy blades in Tenchi Muyo!, although many of these are semi-mystical in nature; the most powerful, the Light Hawk Sword, comes from Tenchi's own God powers. Tenchi's regular sword, named Sword Tenchi (long story), actually serves as a master key to Juraian ships; its combat abilities are just a bonus. It also has the handy ability to throw up a Force Field. Ryoko, Washu, and Kagato have to ability to create energy swords outright, Ryoko's and Washu's being simple orange constructs, and Kagato's being green and more ornate, like a bastard sword. Lightsaber-like sound effects are standard when such swords are activated.

In Tenchi Muyo! GXP, energy swords almost identical to Star Wars lightsabers were implied to be both Galaxy Police standard equipment and carried by space pirates. They even had similar color coding - the Galaxy Police used blue laserblades and space pirates used red.

In Tenchi Universe, the Big BadKagato has a dark version of Tenchi's sword. It looks more like a large bastard sword in energy form than Tenchi's more Katana like blade.

One arc of Gintama contains many Star Wars references (like a character named Obi One Kenofi and arms dealers who look like Yoda as a bankrobber), so naturally, it features beam swords.

Voltron: Three words: Form Blazing Sword! Oddly enough, it was more or less solid. On the other hand, in the CGI-based Revival, "Stealth Voltron" is armed with an N.R.G. Sword.

Yuugen Kaisha: Ayaka's signature weapon is her Star Sword, which she summons by drawing her lipstick and invoking its release command. Upon which, the tube elongates into a sword hilt, while the lipstick itself becomes a light sabre. It even makes the exact same sound effect upon activation.

Gourry's Ancestral Weapon the Sword of Light from Slayers, which at least has the advantage of being completely magical, allowing it to deflect, absorb, channel, amplify and emit incoming magical attacks. It's also capable of extending to nearly Sword Beam lengths. Lina used it to cast the Giga Slave in a desperate attempt to destroy Shabranigdo.

In Slayers Try, sister weapons to the Swords of Light, including a spear, bow, axe, and trident, all lasery.

Then there's the Psi-Blade in the sister series of Slayers, Lost Universe. They share the same method of empowerment, the mental willpower of the user. A particular episode also features a light-whip.

Finally, there's Lina's “Ragna Blade” spell which creates a virtual blade capable of slicing through physical objects, and even reality itself into alternate dimensions. It's the only weapon or spell the monster race cannot avoid by ducking out of our reality.

Pesche has Ultima. It's a sword whose blade is made of shining reishi giving it the appearance of a sword whose blade is made of light.

Subverted with Uryū. The Seele Schneider is a Quincy weapon with a sword's edge. It's made of spirit particles (reishi) and therefore looks like a laser sword and functions as a Vibro Weapon. Uryuu even compares it to a chainsaw. However, while the Seele Schneider can be used in melee combat, it's actually an arrow.

When Ulquiorra releases, he can create green laser lances (called Luz la Luna) out of his reishi, which are just as durable as his normal sword. When he uses his second form, the resulting lance (Lanza del Relámpago) can also serve as a Fantastic Nuke when thrown.

Starrk normally uses twin pistols in his released state, though when the going gets tough, he trades those out for a pair of blue laser swords.

Sword Art Online has the Kagemitsu G4 in Gun Gale Online. This was considered a Joke Weapon since by the time anyone got close enough to someone to use it, they'd be riddled with bullets. Then Kirito gets his hands on one and, thanks to skills honed in two other VRMMO games that emphasized sword fighting, turns it into a Lethal Joke Weapon, deflecting bullets like a Jedi. After he leaves GGO, the Kagemitsu explodes in popularity as players try (with limited succes) to replicate his feats.

Mahou Sensei Negima! has Evangeline emanating some sort of magic energy blade from her hand. She uses it once on the Headmaster (cutting his beard off so he won't interfere in the battle). Later, a weird psuedo-Eva created from a magic scroll and Negi's memories uses it to fight Negi.

While deliberately used to invoke this trope, the spell "Ensis Exsequens" is almost the exact opposite of a conventional Laser Blade; rather than pumping energy into its delineated region, it supposedly drains and isolates energy so as to cause the surroundings of every particle in its effect to become colder relative to it... for every particle simultaneously, vaporizing the matter through sublimation. This incidentally produces intense cold in the blade's vicinity (fitting Eva's theme). It's noted that since this spell directly opposes the laws of thermodynamics (and logic), it's very difficult to cast; Negi's only learned an imperfect version of it.

In basically every single Gundam show ever released, the protagonist's Super Prototype ALWAYS has at LEAST two of these, if not sometimes more. And in fact, they're almost standard issue.

By Gundam F91, they develop the Beam Shield, which is basically a Beam Sword shaped into wide, flat planes and used as a shield.

Strangely, Gundam SEED and Gundam SEED Destiny are a bit more realistic about this: while normal beam sabers do exist, there are a number of physical blades with a beam edge, which answers the question of "how does the beam know where to stop?"

Well, beam sabers in Gundam aren't lasers so that isn't a problem.

Oddly inverted in the case of 00. Whilst Beam Sabers are shown to be highly effective (gradually replacing all other melee weapons), well made solid state blades (like Exia and 00's) are shown to be better.

Not exactly. The solid blades are simply more convenient and tend to have a more free range of utility. You can see it in episode 3 of Gundam 00, the beam saber was more effective in cutting through the Tieran. However, beam sabers are power intensive and while they are lighter than the solid blades, they eat up a lot more power especially as the Raiser sword. Another is the fact that since they do not have any actual solid mass, they are poor weapons against GN fields since the particles are dissipated, making solid weapons much more effective.

Moreover, exia/00/00 quan[T]'s solid blades are special coated vibro-blades, not just a solid piece of metal like the daggers strike Gundam from SEED uses.

Meta Example: In the G Generation title that Gundam 00 debuted in (G gen Wars), Exia and 00 Gundam's GN Blades are listed as being effective against EVERYTHING, protection be damned. This includes Phase Shift Armor (designed to be impervious to physical weapons).

However, you have to note that beam sabers are actually NOT laser blades. Gundam usually differentiates between lasers (the actual ray of light kind, rarely weaponized) and beams (made out of whatever is the Minovsky Particle in the current show, including the Trope Namer).

Bonus points go to Paptimus Scirocco of Zeta Gundam and the PMX-003 The O which has four arms all equipped with beam sabres... though he was beaten by Tieria Erde of Mobile Suit Gundam 00, who packs six sabers at once on his Seravee Gundam. Behold.◊

Kuwabara in YuYu Hakusho can summon an energy sword at will. It's not technically a laser sword since it's actually a manifestation of his spirit energy, but it functionally serves the same role.

The knights in Heroic Age have laser bayonets that can be turned on and off.

Cure Aqua of Yes! Pretty Cure 5, of all people, gets one of these from her first Mid-Season Upgrade. Apparently Karen's a trendsetter, because when it came time for upgrades in the next season, everyone got laser swords.

The Five Star Stories uses its own version, known as a 'spadd': this is often paired with a regular sword, known as a 'speid'. Spadds and speids are used both by human-sized characters and by the giant robots they pilot.

Yu-Gi-Oh! GX had the "Elemental Sword" card, which depending on your point of view, was either thankfully or unfortunately used only twice.

Space Runaway Ideon: The titular Humongous Mecha has such weapon. The "Ideon Blade" is the absolute, indisputed heavyweight champion of this trope. It can cut one whole freaking planet in half, and it is speculated that its reach is potentially infinite.

Aleida & Takane Shishidou in Sora Wo Kakeru Shoujo use weapons called Tachyon Swords in battle (usually with each other).

This is a specific ability granted to One Piece admiral Kizaru thanks to his light-based Devil Fruit powers.

Mina Hazuki of Darker Than Black can turn any object she touches into an energy weapon, be it bokken or wire or pebble.

Fate is the most prominent user. She starts with an energy scythe in the first season, and later gains access to various kinds of Laser Blades, from a BFS, to twin sabers, to a double-ended energy saber.

In Space Usagi "arcane" (ancient) katanas can be adapted to "surge", allowing them to cut through metal and electrify opponents.

After giving up the Ebony Blade, The Avengers member the Black Knight designed and constructed a laser sword, often called his photonic or neural sword. The sword resembles a lightsaber in both its appearance and its effects on non-living matter, but it functions differently when used against living beings. Its "laser" blade is actually a neural disruptor; when the Black Knight cuts someone with it, it delivers a massive jolt to the being's central nervous system. This jolt is usually enough to incapacitate someone within just a few hits. Alternately, Whitman can reverse the sword's energy stream so that it encases its hilt and by extension Whitman's fist in a high-energy field. Using the sword in this fashion enables Whitman to punch with some unspecified degree of enhanced strength.

I was a ninja. I knew there were jutsu and weapons of every description and ability and more. And yet, some things were so deeply ingrained, like the cultural belief that the coolest weapon in the world was made of light and went zshooshm.

Legacy Of the Rasengan:Naruto : Naruto's Kaze Kiwa no Jutsu combines this trope (blade-shaped chakra) with Razor Wind. Yes it is awesome. The length can be determined depending on how much chakra you pour in.

A lightsaber in the Star Wars films is composed of a metal handle that projects a three-foot colored beam of energy that serves as a blade. They can cut through virtually any physical substance, even thick metal bulkheads, but bounce off of each other to enable swordfights. George Lucas intended them to make Jedi more like a classic Knight Errant or samurai. Because they are close-range weapons and can be used to block and reflect blaster fire, they are supposed to be seen as defensive weapons, showing that Jedi use force only to protect themselves. This characterization is pretty much abandoned with Jedi of the Dark Side, who use lightsabers just as readily. Lucas sometimes calls them "laser swords" in interviews and in fact uses this term in the original script.

Being a sci-fi parody, Spaceballs features an obligatory laser sword fight between Lone Starr and Dark Helmet, and the laser blades get tangled at one point. "I hate it when my Schwartz gets twisted!"

Hot Shots! Part Deux features a random Star Wars parody when President Benson and Saddam Hussein suddenly whip out lightsabers during their climactic duel.

In Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, their superhero identities Bluntman & Chronic use lightsabers. Bluntman's is called a "bluntsaber" and Chronic's is a double-bladed "bongsaber". Their archnemesis Cock-Knocker (played by Mark Hamill) uses a "cocksaber".

Chaka Luther King: I think George Lucas is gonna sue somebody!

In The Gamers: Dorkness Rising, Cass finds one which is a leftover from an old campaign.

Lodge: YOU CAN'T USE A LIGHTSABRE! IT'S NOT EVEN THE RIGHT SYSTEM!

Cass: I see no lightsabre. That would be a copyright infringement. I see a psionic spiritblade.

The Return (1980) features an alien-tech bar of light that sometimes burns, sometimes cuts and cauterizes, and sometimes just acts like a normal knife.

Literature

Variable swords in Larry Niven's Known Space stories, which are simply stasis fields wrapped around monofilament wires. A notable subversion in that their power doesn't glow (the wires are nearly invisible, so it doesn't look like much of anything, and only the bright red ball on the end tells you where the sword point is), but they function a lot like energy swords.

M. John Harrison's early Viriconium novel The Pastel City, another pre-Star Wars work, contains energy swords called baan. These have a thoughtful safety feature: the blade materializes around a solid core, which isn't necessary for the weapon to operate, but prevents the blade from activating improperly while it's pointing into the user's body.

They also turn up in a couple of Harrison's later Viriconium stories, but in keeping with Harrison's deconstruction of SF and fantasy tropes turn out to be radioactive and have unpleasant effects on the wielder.

Inquisitor Gregor Eisenhorn carries a pure energy power sword in the Warhammer 40,000 novels Xenos and Malleus, by Dan Abnett. He regards it as much less crude than newer models, which are basically swords with a power field around them. It still doesn't do him any good when he tries to cut an Eldritch Abomination with it.

The "force knife" in the Lucky Starr series, published starting in 1952, was the likely origin of the sci-fi version of this weapon. Technically, it's not a laser—it works the same way as a force field—but it's incredibly thin and can cut through anything, making it quite deadly. The hero's sidekick Bigman Jones carries one, and can wield it with great skill if needed.

In John Meaney's Nulapeiron Sequence books (and the prequel, To Hold Infinity there may be found a device called a Lattice Blade. Apparently never used as a battlefield weapon, it is quite capable of slicing off a limb and being extended or contracted in size, yet remain pocketable when deactivated.

"...To put it simply, if I could sell a penknife with a force-field blade to a nobleman, it would be to his interest to force laws that would allow him to use it. Put that baldly, it sounds silly, but it is sound, psychologically. To make strategic sales, at strategic points, would be to create a pro-nucleics faction at court."

More likely, it's from Fritz Leiber's Gather Darkness (published in 1943), where the "rods of wrath" cause a lot of mayhem on bystanders when used in a duel:

"Like two ancient swordsmen, then, the warlock and the deacon dueled together. Their weapons were two endless blades of violet incandescence, but their tactics were those of sabreurs - feint, cut, parry, swift riposte."

In Melisa Michaels' Skyrider series, when a belter picks a fight with Skyrider because she's trying to remain neutral in the Earth/Belt conflict, he ends up stabbing her with a "force blade".

Mocked in the Wheel of Time, when one of the Chosen points out to the Dragon Reborn that his sword made entirely of fire is one the worst way to use his power that they can think of. Given that at one point the Dragon Reborn seriously considers snuffing out all of reality, they were probably right.

Either Moraine or Siuan did it as well using Air, to demonstrate how stupid doing it was. While she was going for a gender thing, it's still accurate: at least Rand knows how to use a sword, well enough to make it a practical way to express power, and isn't oathbound to never use such a weapon against non-Shadowspawn or to let somebody else use it.

M.C.A. Hogarth's Paradox series has holoswords, which project a Hard Light blade of variable length, width, and sharpness. They're primarily used for fencing, with an entire fighting style based around changing the blade settings in the middle of combat, but in Laisrathera Hirianthial uses one to great effectiveness in a series of duels.

Another possible Ur Example is E. T. A. Hoffmann's Master Flea, first published in 1822, which features a duel between two sorcerers using ray emitting pocket telescopes. There are no rays visible, and it's not quite clear whether these are Laser Blades or Ray Guns, but the physical strain and use of "feints, parries, thrusts, in short, all the tricks of the fencing-school" strongly implies the former.

As of Skin Game, Fidelacchius is now basically a light saber. What makes this even better is that the person wielding it Butters is a Star Wars fan. And so, as it turns out, is the Archangel Uriel.

In Wolfling (1969) by Gordon R. Dickson the preferred weapon of High-Born (haughty, but highly advanced Human Aliens ruling an interstellar empire) are hand-sized "pipes" that project an energy beam, length of which can be varied during fight.

Live-Action TV

Bibleman sports one of these, and the Star Wars influence is not subtle in the least.

In The New Adventures of Robin Hood when Marian is kidnapped to be a demon god's bride, Robin shows up with an Unicorn horn that can changed into different energy weapon's, one of which is a energy sword. This dissolves into a light saber duel when the lead worshiper, possessed by the god, reveals his own energy sword.

In Lexx S02E01 Zev uses a light saber-like device, that looks more like a light saber with a handle of a chainsaw, to cut a dormant gigantic insect into tiny pieces. This device, like most of the devices in Lexx, is not named.

Kamen Rider Faiz's bike handlebar sword takes on this appearance; it has no cutting edge as the damage comes from the energy in the blade.

A few Power Rangers and Super Sentai weapons resemble lightsabers. Red isn't evil; it just means its wielder is The Hero. Blades generally glow when doing a Finishing Move, but are not energized all the time and have a metal rod (not sharp; it's the energy that does the damage) that can be seen beneath them. This goes for the aforementioned Faiz Edge and Revolcane/Electro Saber.

In VR Troopers, JB's sword can take on a lightsaber glow, and even extend into a laser-lance, with which he does most of his finishing. Sorry, Darth Maul, you were beaten to the punch by quite a few years.

Warehouse13 has one of these in their Eureka crossover, wielded by Fargo. It's a laser cutter from Eureka that was "modified" with Benjamin Franklin's ring from the Warehouse. That turns it into an actual lightsaber that even makes the appropriate sounds when moved. Fargo, being a Hollywood Nerd, is in love with the improvised weapon.

An episode of Earth: Final Conflict features an assassin using dual laser blades to assassinate people, while framing others using dreams. Notable for being of human design, as Taelons aren't big on swordfighting. Additionally, the blade can "extend" from either end, depending on which button is pushed, which is how Liam kills the assassin.

The intro to Even Stevens has Ren and Louis Stevens sitting in front of the TV, each with a remote control trying to change channel to what they want to watch. When they can't agree, they turn their remote controls into lightsabers and begin to battle one another in a display of sibling rivalry.

In the Red Dwarf episode, The Inquisitor, Kryten uses a laser chainsaw to hack off the eponymous villain's hand to allow his past self and Lister to take the Inquisitor's time gauntlet. He is killed in the process, but thanks to Lister's later plan he gets better.

Defiance has force-blades, typically the glowing blue blade is the size of a large scalpel (their original use), but at least once one was extended to shortsword length.

The Shadows in Babylon 5 have a unique combat tactic where their large battleships send out an energy beam and slash other ships with it, instead of shooting them.

The Goodies: In "Snow White 2", Tim and Graeme have a duel with light sabers.

Pinball

Prominently featured in nearly all of the Star Wars pinballs, of course.

Warhammer 40,000 has Power Weapons, weapons surrounded by a powerfield, thus rendering them capable of tearing through pretty much everything, as well as force-weapons, weapons powered by the psychic might of its user, thus rendering them capable of tearing through everything. Both weapons exist in all possible varieties, from sword to spear.

Both weapons have a solid core the energy field surrounds, however, and function as regular weapons when the power is turned off.

The first Eisenhorn novel mentions that Eisenhorn possessed one of the energy blade models, emphasising how rare and precious it is.

The energy blade is statted in the Dark Heresy splatbook Inquisitor's Handbook. It's very Awesome but Impractical as using it creates bright light and loud noise, making stealth impossible since it's really a beam of plasma energy. It also runs on plasma weapon canisters and can only be sustained for about a minute at the most.

Rifts has Cyber Knights and Mind Melters wielding Psi Swords, which they can create with their minds. Also the Lightblade, a Magitek weapon.

1st edition had the Wand of Force; one of its powers was to create a 3-foot long luminescent shaft-shaped forcefield emanating from the wand itself that could be wielded as a + 5 longsword. Does This Remind You of Anything??

Later "Mordenkainen's Sword" spell did something very close to this.

And let's not forget Brilliant Energy weapons, which are often called "lightsabers" by the fandom.

Don't forget the Soulknife, a character class that can make an energy sword out of pure will!

Greyhawk spell "Jaran's Prismatic Blade" essentially is Prismatic Sphere in the form of a sword wielded by the caster. Inability to use spells with somatic components while this thing is active is a small price for this grade of destruction.

In the d20 Modern sourcebook D20 Future, one available weapon is the Beam Sword, a "small metal handle generating a solid beam of plasma contained by a gravity induced forcefield."

In the less known RPG "Ammo", laser swords are an excellent weapon with variable power settings. Sadly, the higher damage setting drains its energy reserve in a matter of seconds. Psi-blade are more powerful if held by fighters with high willpower, and less consuming.

TSR's Gamma World featured Force Swords that were force-fields shaped into a blade and could cut through anything except another force field (alongside a wide gamut of high-tech melee weapons, including vibro and monofilament blades). Since the first release was in 1978, it's debatable how these weapons correlated with the introduction of Lightsabers in the original Star Wars.

Paranoia has force swords, explained as monofilament fiber inside a force field. Too bad they're only available at Blue clearance. This being Alpha Complex, the force field periodically fails, putting the wielder at risk of cutting himself as the fiber whips around loose.

Shadowrun has the Centurion Laser Axe, although it's never made quite clear how the laser beam follows the arced blade... All the rules state is that it can lose it's focus when hitting hard materials like heavy armor.

Sentinels Of The Multiverse has Gene-Bound Ion-Lancer and L'Epeiste, minions who work for Grand Warlord Voss and La Capitan respectively, each wield one. Ion-Lancer's grants him immunity to energy damage and damages the hero with the least HP, while L'Epeiste's lets him deal damage to the healthiest hero equal to the number of Equipments and ongoings the heroes have.

Dragonstar has Sunswords, sacred plasma swords that use divine magic to channel the power of suns.

The closest thing Myriad Song has to the traditional "lightsaber" is the Xenharmonic Blade, commonly carried by Remanence Aristocrats and SyndicLost Technology. Laser torches can also be used as improvised weapons like many other power tools. Meanwhile Ghibli blades consist of a "hilt" resembling a small jet engine and project a "blade" of superheated air.

The Ray Sword from Rocket Age, essentially a lightsaber made up energy contained by the same kind of technology as RAY shielding.

Video Games

In StarCraft, Protoss Zealots wield Psychic Power-fueled energy swords called "Psi Blades". Dark Templar wield more powerful blades, but with a different power source, called "Warp Blades".

Expanded Universe novels imply that especially-powerful Protoss like Tassadar can create those at will without the use of amplifiers.

Dungeon Fighter Online has these as an exclusive type of sword for Blade/weapon Masters and Vagabonds (not yet in any NA build), with a few other weapons having a beam type. While not as powerful as other examples, it's the fastest weapon they can use by far and the 'shock' damage they can inflict will add armor ignoring damage to combos (making them usefu for enemies with Metal Slime level defenses)

Zero's Z-Saber in the Mega Man X series, which, in addition to being friggin' cool, also had the ability to change shape, length, and power as the situation required. Not to mention elements. He can turn it into a flaming sword of death (which makes sense, sort of) or into a sword made entirely of ice (which just breaks several laws of physics). X8 grants him laser harisen, a laser glaive, and a laser hammer and knuckle dusters.

X would later receive this Z-Saber in X6, with Zero getting a new one that's literally exactly like the ones from Star Wars. He can still imbue it with elements however.

In X5 and X6 there is Dynamo who has a variable length dual ended Laser sword.

In the Mega Man Zero series, there's Harpuia (who uses TWO), Omega, and Elpizo, who all use their own laser swords. In addition, Zero also gets a laser spear, laser shield, a laser grappling hook (made from the remains of the laser spear), and laser tonfa.

The final boss in the original Mega Man X used, you guessed it, a lightsaber.

The Energy Sword from the Halo series. According to the fluff, it's actually a envelope of plasma that's held in shape by electromagnetic fields. It's good for both dueling and assassinations, since the blades turn invisible along with the active-camo used by Elites.

Halo: Reach shows that some Elites, in addition to their plasma swords, wield wrist-mounted plasma daggers.

System Shock and its sequel have the Laser Rapier, replete with "growing" animation and constant droning noise (which gets irritating pretty quickly), but it has neither the power, the brightness, the sparks or the cut-everything-to-bits destructive capability of lightsabers. From the in-game description: The unit works by projecting a porous field of reflective material in a shaft shaped region around the base of the rapier. When the material is bent (as when the rapier strikes a target) the intense refracted light inside is released locally, causing intense burns to the target. Of course, the attack animation doesn't display this alleged local release of burning light which, surprisingly consistent with actual lasers, damages mechanical enemies more than biological ones. System Shock 2 also has the Cerebro-Energetic Extension psi power that temporarily generates a semi-transparent psi sword for you to use.

It's not technically a laser blade in the first, but just an Absurdly Sharp Blade: This energized lance projects a monofilament thread that is suspended in a contained energy field. Upon contact, the thread slices through organic and synthetic materials, permanently disabling most creatures and robots.

In the first, there wasn't much point to using anything else once you got it - so long as your batteries didn't run out, it'd happily chop through organics or robots alike, and when combined with the rollerskates turned you into a near-invincible juggernaut. It's nerfed significantly in the sequel, though: Not only does it do less damage,but it specializes in killing enemies that explode upon death, with predictable results.

The Beam Sword in the Super Smash Bros. series. In the first game it had a definite length, while in Melee it starts off short but extends when used to land strong attacks. And in the Japanese version, it actually used lightsaber sound effects. (In Brawl, the lightsaber sound effects came overseas as well.) Melee and Brawl also had the blade automatically scale to suit the wielder's size.

In the Shining Force series, the first game's plot involved the main character wielding a Laser Blade that was made of Light Energy and another one that was made of Dark Energies. The "Chaosbreaker" obtained later in the game (renamed the "Force Sword" in the series' later installments) is made of both of these energies. All three swords are obtained through the normal playthrough and are all considered Swords Of Plot AdvancementandInfinity Plus One Swords to boot! (But you lose the Light and Dark swords in order get the Chaosbreaker.)

Travis' Beam Katana in No More Heroes actually handles this in a sensible and relatively realistic manner. The hilt extends a "cap" to terminate the beam, and the beam is projected along a central filament strung between the hilt and the cap. The downside is that this makes the Beam Katana look like nothing so much as a Fluorescent Light-bulb Of Death. Then again, given the game's sense of humor, this was probably intentional.

Then again, he can upgrade to a five-bladed version of the Beam Katana, which looks less like a sword than a large laser club...

Then again again, his ultimate weapon plays this trope straight. It is, quite literally, a beam katana, fashioned after the weapon of his recently deceased master.

And when you consider the sequel and the other characters in both games, there's a beam lance, beam zanbatou, beam nodachi, beam ''giant briefcase that transforms into a katana/ludicrously oversized straight-razor"...

Kirby 64 The Crystal Shards has Darth Maul-esque double-bladed lightsabers with Cutter+ Spark. A tap of the button kills everything around Kirby, and enemies die just by walking into the blade. Yes, it's as Bad Ass as it sounds.

In The Guardian Legend, the eponymous Guardian's Saber Laser (single blade) and Cutter Laser (dual blade) sub-weapons deal lots of damage to enemies at close range. When she's in ship mode, they're not quite as effective.

In Tales of Phantasia, by hunting a little in the sunken city of Thor, you can get Laser Blades for Cless to wield. If you happen to pick up extras, they sell for quite a price back in Medieval Stasis land. And if you're too lazy to hunt for them, they're storebought a bit later on.

Kratos can wield that as well. And if you do have him rejoin you, he comes already equipped with one, rather than his flashy Flamberge. Unfortunately, he comes for a boss fight, and the laser blade is light elemental. Guess what the boss's Element is.

Deus Ex has the Dragon's Tooth. While visually resembling a Laser Blade, it is in fact an Absurdly Sharp Blade constantly maintained by a nanite cloud. The blue glow is a side effect of the nanites, which the sword shares with all other nanite-based items (Paul's and JC's eyes, upgrade canisters, augmentation canisters...).

Makai Kingdom has laser blades as a weapon class. They are noticeable for having the highest base attack of all the melee weapons bar none, and are really good against vehicles as well. However, none of the base classes you gain prior to a New Game+ can proficiently use them.

The Unknown aka Young Xehanort of Birth By Sleep and Dream Drop Distance dual-wields a pair of blue Laser Blades. The Keyblade associated with him, No Name, is essentially a Laser Blade Keyblade.

The local incarnation of Squall / Leon can form one of these out of his Gunblade as a shoutout to Squall's "Blasting Zone" finisher

In Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep, Terra and Aqua share a Command Style called Bladecharge that forms one of these around their Keyblade. in Dream Drop Distance Riku has this power as a Link Style.

In Disgaea: Hour of Darkness you'll occasionally come across enemies wielding a 'Light Saber' which looks exactly like a Star Wars lightsaber. These can be stolen, and if found as legendary quality weapons can become quite decent Infinity Plus One weapons if levelled properly.

The flavor text on them even has a bit of a Shout-Out— "The force may be with you..."

The actual Infinity+1 Sword, the Yoshitsuna, has the appearance of a laser blade.

There are other laser weapons in Disgaea 2. There are even laser spears and laser axes.

Dead Rising, which takes place in a shopping mall, has several toy laser swords you can loot from a toy shop. They do terrible damage, at least in the original as compared to the powerful but fragile ones in Chop Till You Drop, but the fact they make you emit a glow when wielded (and, strangely, when held in your inventory) basically make them the game's torches. There's also a special unlockable Real Laser Sword, but its durability means you can't use it long.

Final Fantasy Legend has a weapon called an "L-saber". The Japanese version straight up calls it a "lightsaber", and the ones featured in the Nintendo DS remake of Legend II looks exactly like, well...

One weapon (at circa 1:45) in Super Robot Wars is an enormous laser sword that makes no effort to stop its blade. The bloody thing is visible from space.

In Gunstar Heroes, the lightning + fire combo creates a gun that shoots a laser that terminates after a short distance. This pseudo laser sword is one of the best combos in the game because it can deal out a lot of damage and cancel out most enemy shots.

From Escape Velocity: Nova comes the ever-popular Thunderhead Lance - essentially a giant beam of damage sticking out the front of your ship. Makes absolutely no sense, but when your end result is space jousting, how could you not?

Einhänder has a laser blade weapon pod. The Einhander is a space fighter with a grappling arm specifically built to use enemies guns as it finds them. Enemies using a laser blade do not have a grappling arm. They just have a laser sword sticking out of a hardpoint in their front that may be pointed at you. It is the most beautifully nonsensical thing in the game, especially since doing a fireball motion while activating it will cause it to lance forward about three times its original length for a moment.

The original Jets'n'Guns has the Tsunami Generator which, when fully upgraded, resembles a laser bat'leth. The Gold Edition adds the Tsunami Beta, which resembles a spinning laser bat'leth. They're also amazingly powerful, and (somewhat realistically) create a huge amount of waste heat.

The Neverwinter Nights Community Expansion Pack includes alternate blade appearances for weapons from daggers to rapiers to two-bladed swords that look remarkably like lightsabers. They don't actually change the in-game effect, however.

The d20 Modern Mod completely alters the kukris to replace by Star Wars-style lightsabers.

In Silent Hill 3's New Game+, one of the potential bonus weapons is a "beam saber." Given that the game is possibly the darkest (both figuratively and literally) of the series, and that the main character is both the youngest of the series' protagonists and the only female among them, the game can feel extremely oppressive. So it's a bit of a Mood Whiplash (though not necessarily in a bad way) when you gain the ability to turn Heather into the Magical Girl "Princess Heart" (complete with Transformation Sequence and appropriate costume), and either fight with a lightsabre or shoot laser beams from your freaking eyes.

Hwang in Soul Edge has two "light-edged" swords in his repertoire, one whose blade is transparent and his Ultimate weapon, whose very long edge is only visible when swung. These were later inherited by his pseudo-Moveset Clone Yun-seong since Soulcalibur II.

Funny how two Sith and a Jedi finally jump in and shows everybody how it's really done in Soulcalibur IV.

Coinciding with his full transformation into a Cyborg since Tekken 3, Yoshimitsu's katana has been shown as glowing like a lightsaber. Official art and material explains it's just the evil energy stored in it that does the trick, thought.

Space Pirates in Metroid Prime use energy blades as melee weapons. In the sequel they only had metal blades (altho they were called "photonic scythes", so they may have been a 40k-style "power field" involved), except for the Pirate Commandoes, who carried a gun that could fire energy projectiles or large exploding balls of every, as well as project a short beam blade.

Elite Pirates have energy claws.

Star Ocean gave you light sabers called "Force Sword" (with a graphic nearly identical to the Star Wars version) as part of the plot; they were the only weapons that could harm the Big Bad.

Taking place in the future, several Phantasy Star weapons are comprised of lasers, or "photons", in the Online/Universe games. Armor, as well; one wonders why they didn't outright call it a force field, but we know the real reason.

These are very common off-hand weapons in Armored Core. Generally, they're used to destroy stationary or slow-moving targets like gun turrets while conserving ammo, though there are Difficult but Awesome builds that rely entirely on blade combat, using boosters to keep up with faster targets. The Player Character always starts off with a Laser Blade, and two of the most prominent Laserblades were the Moonlight, a heavy LB with some insane stats, and the Toros, a shield that had two Laserblades and was known as Stinger's weapon of choice in one of the games.

Touhou has Flandre Scarlet and her Lavaetein. I believe it's supposedly made out of fire, but hey, this is a bullet hell shooter. It sure LOOKS like a Laser Blade to me.

In official art, its inactive form looks more like an oddly-shaped wand or whip.

Hinanawi Tenshi's Sword of Scarlet Thought also applies, at times.

World of Warcraft has a few of those available to players. Among them the retardedly rare, and thus disgustingly expensive, Teebu's Blazing Longsword. Many players probably don't even know this weapon exists. It's that rare.

A total of four of these exist in World of Warcraft - A red one, which is a rare world drop, a bright orange/pink one which is also a rare world drop, and two blue ones - one is a quest reward, the other has a chance to drop off a boss inside an instance. The blue ones can be enchanted with a fire enchant, which makes them glow purple.

At least one more was added in Cataclysm. This one is actually called a "Very Light Sabre", and is among the best weapons you can possibly get at the time of the quest... which is level 3 - and exclusive to gnome warriors. Each gnome class gets its own Star WarsShout-Out, from the Death Star (rogue mace) and Staff of the Force (priest staff), to the decidedly more obscure Vibro Knife (warlock dagger) and Electro-Staff (mage staff).

There's also the Runeforging ability Death Knights get that can be used on swords, that while not making the swords in question in question trueLaser Blades, they glow vividly just like real ones.

Battle Realms gives the Ronin and Samurai swords that can turn into these. The Wolf Clan Dryad starts off with nature-powered Laser Blades.

In the second Warriors Orochi game, Yoshitsune Minamoto has a special gauntlet that produces an energy blade. Said gauntlet and blade can even fire energy blades.

Multi-Dimensional Thief, an old text adventure game, parodies the Star Wars lightsaber. It can cut anything as long as it's an inventory object, and some versions of the game allow the lightsaber to either cut itself or your fingers (without ill effects other than losing the lightsaber.) Just don't go through a hole while carrying it.

Aion currently has a weapon skin called the "Aether Blade" which can be purchased from their website and used to remodel your character, while it doesn't extend the way a Star Wars style Light Saber would, it does strongly resemble one while remaining legally distinct from it.

Not merely content to show Amaterasu up and be a general thorn in her paws, Waka in Ōkami had to have a better sword than Ammy to boot! While she has to make due with metallic blades (made of divine metals, mind you, but metal nonetheless), he gets the Laser Sword... and a Laser Sword that extends from inside of his flute! Showing her up that bad ought to be considered blasphemy if not a mortal sin!

Wizardry being full of Schizo Tech, the top sword of the last three games is the Light Sword - a Lightsabre that your warriors in full plate can wield.

Sword-wielders in City of Heroes can get these as unlockables. There's even a laser axe. No change in power and they still do the same type of damage, but hotly pursued nonetheless.

Shin Megami Tensei I has Plasma Swords as a weapon usable only by Law Hero (or a lawful Main Character). Since items didn't have graphics in that game, we don't really know what it looked like, though.

In Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, combining the Nitesco glyph with any weapon glyph will make Shanoa smack the enemy with a Laser BFS several times her own size. This is the strongest attack in the game, and sufficiently boosted it can take even Dracula himself out with just a few swipes.

The Monado it's a particularly odd example. It looks like an odd BFS while inactive, but while active, the blade opens up to reveal an even bigger laser blade, capable of getting big enough to be wielded by the Bionis, a titan whose body makes up half the known world! Even when being wielded by Shulk, the blade is quite large, and the Monado Buster attack makes the blade extend to a truly ridiculous length for the duration of a single strike.

There are also more "mundane" laser blades courtesy of the Machina in the form of swords for Dunbanand replicas of the Monado for Shulk.

In Mass Effect 3, Shepard gains access to the omni-blade, a modification to the standard omni-tool that unfurls out to create a searing hot silicon-carbide blade, suspended in mass effect fields. The in-universe explanation for their sudden appearance is that they had been designed years ago but were considered useless, since enemies rarely would get into close-quarters enough for them to be used.

There are many versions of this because every class wields their own melee weapon (Though they are not all blades) such as the sentinel who wields two omni blades, infiltrators with two-pronged electrified blades, or engineers, who simply slam a flaming silicon-carbide disc into their enemies with the back of their hand.

It's also worth noting that Omni-blades are not laser blades or hardlight, but the suspended 'blade' is invisible on it's own. The Omni-tool creates a holographic sheathe to provide visual context for the user and allies.

One type of the enemies as well as one of the boses of the old arcade game Xain D'Sleena (aka: Solar Warrior) use laser blades. If they hit you with them, you are dead, no matter how much life you've remaining.

At least one character in EV Nova is noted to have a "laser rapier" hooked to his belt.

Warframe has the Gram, a Tenno BFS which uses a blade made of plasma on each side of the weapon to cleanly slice enemies to bits. Its smaller brother, the Plasma Sword, functions pretty much identically (and originally, the Gram was just a giant version of the Plasma Sword). The "Ether" weapons (scythe, daggers, swords) use an Absurdly Sharp Blade made from plasma.

X-Com: Apocalypse has "plasma sword", one of Earth improvements over alien plasma weapons from the first game. When off it looks like a long and narrow serrated metal cone with a handle and a guard. When on it is engulfed by plasma. In game terms it is a plasma gun with very short range (1 square, sometimes 2 because of a bug) but unlimited ammo and highest damage. (Rockets and explosives do 2-4 times more damage, but the sword has higher fire rate.) Unfortunately they only appear in stores 1-2 weeks after the game starts and are always in short supply — by the time you get enough for the whole squad, you would already have armed them with captured heavy disruptors (10% weaker, but with unlimited range).

"Thermal lances" from X-Com: Terror from the Deep may also qualify. Those are alien heated drills used as close combat weapons.

Web Animation

Haloid. Samus has one that not only cuts things but acts as a tractor beam, blaster and stasis field generator.

In Red vs. Blue, Tucker ends up with an energy sword that works only for him (much to Tex's dismay). It also briefly functions as a key.

Caboose: Or maybe it's a key all the time, and when you stick it in people, it unlocks their death.

Webcomics

The multi-purpose "aser-blades" (not a typo) in the space arc of Arthur, King of Time and Space. Described in full in this strip, including comparision to a lightsaber (without actually saying "lightsaber").

Darth Maul sells Zexion lightsabers in Ansem Retort. He claims to have a hundred of them in his car to sell to Star Wars geeks for organs.

Note that Zexion hasn't really used them since season one, unlike Darth Maul and Xemnas, who use them to this day.

In keeping with the general theme of the comic, Darths & Droids offers humorous alternate explanations for the use of lightsabers. GM "just took a D&D equipment list and stuck techy words in front", Qui-gon and Obi-wan only have lightsabers because they didn't start off with enough money to buy blasters, and the Jedi are able to block blaster fire because the players fast-talked the GM into letting them do so.

And, to boot, they always use the "laser sword" terminology in lieu of "lightsaber".

In the Whateley Universe, Tennyo can generate a "laser blade" made of anti-matter. How she makes anti-matter at will is a whole 'nother problem. Word of God says the devisors and gadgeteers can't make working lightsabers, even though they all try, sooner or later.

In animated Teen Titans, there's an extremely fanboyish villain named Control Freak who, it turns out, is a decent fighter due to The Matrix-style programmed skill. His weapon of choice is a light-lance made of two sets of dual beams. (The colors are red, blue, green, and purple, the four colors of lightsabers in the Star Wars movies.)

In the pilot episode of the Bucky O'Hare cartoon, Deadeye Duck freaks out because he thinks the "hairless ape" intruder (actually human Willy) is packing a lightsaber (he actually says "lightsaber", too). Turns out it's just a generic flashlight.

She Ra Princess Of Power featured energy blades in the hands of some secondary characters, meaning they weren't even close to most powerful thing around in that universe.

Your mileage may vary...in one episode She-Ra's friendly aerial pirate is trapped in a subterranean cave with an ominous charachter who totally pwns him in personal combat due to various gadgets much cooler than the ones he had access to. The most severe pwnage occurred when said character lighted up a "photon cutlass" with which he sent poor Hawk flying freely around after he tried to deflect a blow with his mere "laser sabre". So photon cutlasses packed punch in She-Ra's universe!

Moreover the asskicking character was later revealed to be Hawk's long-lost pirate father who was just fooling around and testing his kid's mettle. In the end he donated all of his asskicking equipment to his son.

The eponymous hero of Ulysses 31 wields a "Raypier" which doubles as an energy pistol and a laser sword. For defence, he has an energy shield (think Captain America when his usual shield was stolen) which he wears on one wrist like a watch.

Parodied in Futurama: police officers use lightsabers as non-lethal batons.

They even have laser handcuffs. Apparently these so-called "lasers" in the Futurama-verse are actually some kind of luminous force-fields.

In Teamo Supremo, Laser Pirate's main weapon is his laser hook, which can morph into other weapons, such as a laser blade and a laser cannon.

In 1987, there was a U.S.-produced series called Hello Kitty's Furry Tale Theater, with Sanrio's eponymous character and her friends parodying fairy tales, and even popular movies. One episode featured a parody of Star Wars, complete with Tuxedo Sam (who played the Luke Skywalker character) and Catnip (who played the Darth Vader character) having a lightsaber fight (which also happens in the Title Sequence). The episode "Paws of the Round Table" had all the swords, including Excalibur, replaced with lightsabers.

Young Justice: Whisper wields a pair of laser whips against Superboy and the Forever People in "Disordered".

Real Life

On his Sci-Fi Science television series, Dr. Michio Kaku explored the possibility of making a real-life lightsaber out of an extended plasma torch. Unfortunately, this required trillions of nanobatteries, theoretical superceramics, and enough electricity to power a small city. This may be viable in the long-term, but unlikely for the next few decades.

The main practical application of this would be as an extremely effective chainsaw that could cut through virtually any material, though at extreme danger to the user, but its not as if plasma cutters are exactly safe to begin with.

Supplimental Star Wars material states clearly that using a lightsaber without a certain degree of force sensitivity is extremely dangerous. Perhaps hand-guards may work as an alternative.

Not so much. The danger, both in-universe and IRL, is not to the hand holding the blade, but to all your OTHER limbs. The reason for this in-universe, and a plausible one out of it, is that the magnetic containment of the blade interacts with any other magnetic field (like that of the planet you're standing on) creating a tendency to twist and move in a direction you didn't plan. Think about that demonstration of gyroscopic torque that your science teacher probably showed you, the one where you hold the axles of a spinning bike wheel. Wielding a lightsaber is a little like that, only if you lose control, it doesn't snag on your shirt, it cuts your leg off.

It's worth noting that this does have a physical "blade", though you wouldn't be able to see it when it's on through the plasma. If it's telescoping, you also wouldn't be able to see it when it's off either, so for all we know the Jedi used that trick too.

It is worth noting that we can build a lightsaber today... except that we need a building's worth of equipment to make the beam long enough. As technology can be fitted in more tight spaces, it may become viable as a stealth weapon, as a blaster using plasma is basically shooting controlled lightning (meaning it's loud).

Also worth noting is that plasma hot enough to almost instantaneously cut through just about anything, including metal (as most "laser blades" are depicted being), tends to be hot. Very, VERY hot. Ballpark figure, somewhere in the range of 45,000 degrees F. Yes, plasma torches exist that don't melt when you use them, but the hands and bodies of those using them tend to have to be shielded by some form of insulation to avoid getting burns. This is just yet another complication in the noble attempts of science to figure out a feasible means of making the beloved lightsaber a (portable) reality.

A thermal lance (some may recognize them from Fallout: New Vegas) is a real world device that some liken to a lightsaber. It essentially burns iron rods to create an intense stream of heat out one end, kinda like a gigantic blow torch but much hotter. Granted they are much bigger than a lightsaber hilt and would require two hands to wield, but the stream to project has all the cutting power, they are normally used to cut through solid concrete and steel girders.

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